By: Delaney Gouveia
The term “industry plant” is originally derived from the hip-hop genre, denoting somebody who finds success incredibly quickly, describing themselves as self-made or independent while having the backing of a major record label. They might hide their connections or advantages in the music world to seem more relatable, authentic, or down to earth. The term is also used to refer to musicians whose stardom and popularity are manufactured by their representation, or whose talent does not match their level of popularity and success. However, “industry plant” can be used incorrectly. Many people believe that if an artist’s music seemingly “blows up” out of nowhere through social media or on the radio, that makes them an industry plant. But this is not necessarily true. An artist who gets popular very quickly can be an industry plant, but it doesn’t mean that they are one.
Nevertheless, the term is thrown around at a lot of artists that don’t really fit the description. Many artists that have gained popularity quickly are still arguably self-made and authentic regardless. Two such artists are Reneé Rapp and Ice Spice. While both had a pretty fast rise to popularity in the music industry, each had a fairly long history in the music world before finding success. Similarly, neither rely on connections or marketing from record labels to create a public persona or gain a following.
Ice Spice is a female rapper who rose to popularity pretty quickly when her song “Munch (Feelin’ U)” went viral on TikTok in 2022. She went on to collaborate with Taylor Swift, Nicki Minaj, and other influential artists soon after. The speed of her rise to fame sparked rumors that she might be an industry plant. Ice Spice responded to these rumors in an interview with Variety saying: “I just let people believe what they want to believe.” However, with her personal history, Ice Spice is arguably one of the most self-made female rappers of the 2020s. She grew up as Isis Gaston in the Bronx, New York, and took a liking to rap music around age seven. This was due to her father’s history as an underground rapper (which refers to a rapper signed by an independent label, or no label at all). Isis began writing her own poetry and freestyle raps during middle and high school, playing backing instrumentals on her phone and rapping out loud to them. She ended up deciding she wanted music to be her career in freshman year of high school, and chose the stage name Ice Spice.
She attended SUNY Purchase as a communications major for two years before dropping out after feeling like school wasn’t the right fit. Her music career really took off in early 2021 when she met with record producer RiotUSA and began making music on SoundCloud, gaining popularity across the internet. On August 10, 2022, she released “Munch (Feelin’ U)” as the lead single of her EP Like…? The song began trending after being played on Drake’s Sirius XM radio station, and went viral on Twitter and TikTok soon after. Later, she signed a record deal with 10K Projects and Capitol Records. After the release of her EP, she began to collaborate with other artists, and her collaborations with Taylor Swift and Pink Pantheress charted at number two and three of the Billboard Hot 100, respectively.
Despite her massive success over such a short period, Ice Spice is decidedly not an industry plant. If her personal history and authentic roots were not enough, the fact that she didn’t even have the backing of a record label when her music got popular makes it clear that her rise to stardom was organic, and not manufactured.
Another new artist who has had this accusation brought against her is Reneé Rapp. She, like Ice Spice, had a pretty fast rise to fame within the music industry. In a little under two years she released her first EP, went on a national tour, released her first album paired with an international tour, and sang on Saturday Night Live. While this may seem like a manufactured rise to success to some, the truth is that her roots in the theater industry are what gave her backing in music, not undeserved connections or record label scheming.
Reneé participated in musical theater all throughout high school, and was invited to perform at the tenth annual Jimmy Awards (or the National High School Musical Theater Awards) in New York City during her senior year. There, she won the award for Best Performance by an Actress, beating out 40 other competitors. Shortly after in 2018, Reneé was cast as Wendla in Theater Charlotte’s regional production of Spring Awakening. Afterwards, she began living and performing in New York City at BroadwayCon 2019 and 54 Below. On May 28, 2019, it was announced that she would be replacing Taylor Louderman as Regina George in Broadway’s Mean Girls: The Musical. The show ran until March 12, 2020 when it was closed due to the Broadway shutdown. During this time, Reneé started writing her own music, and her first EP was released two years later.
While her time as an artist in the pop music industry has been short, her history with music has been quite long. She received all of the roles and gigs through her own talent and merit, and was not given opportunities by the urging of a record label or music industry connections. In fact, her Broadway-style training has added to the impressive vocal abilities heard in her songs and live performances. So while Reneé Rapp did have a seamless transfer into recording music, she is not an industry plant.
Both Reneé Rapp and Ice Spice gained their success in an organic and deserved way. While some may see it as manufactured, in truth, both artists built themselves from the ground up in non-plant fashion, without the help of a record label.
